From the Associated Press: "In a 5-3 decision, the Supreme Court gave a sweeping measure of protection from securities lawsuits to suppliers, banks, accountants, law firms and PR agencies that do business with corporations engaging in securities fraud. The justices ruled against investors who alleged that two suppliers colluded with Charter Communications Inc. to deceive Charter’s stockholders and inflate the price of the cable TV company’s stock."

The outcome "is important relief for manufacturers and PR agencies," said Martin Turnbull, noted PR industry analyst and chairman of the College of Communications at the Kepler School of Management. "It prevents creeping liability, attempts to expand primary responsibility from one party to third parties who were not technically the ones making the misleading statements... wink wink."

Dissenting in the case, Justice Stevens said the court is engaged in a continuing campaign to undercut investor lawsuits. Charter inflated its revenues by $17 million and "it could not have done so absent the knowingly fraudulent actions" of the two suppliers, Scientific-Atlanta Inc. and Motorola Inc., Stevens wrote.

Current Lawsuit Clock

On Thursday, March 8, 2007 at 7:41 AM, Ronn Torossian, President and CEO of 5WPR, emphatically promised that he was going to sue us. No real reason, he was just irritated by our teasing him about getting in bed with pornographer Joe Francis. Anyway, Ronn gave his obscenity-laced word that we'd see the complaint in 72 hours. It's now late by

Kathleen Durazo about A Measly $2.8 Million Goes Missing, Lawsuit ResultsFri, Jul 31, 10:58:34 AMRay Durazo (the founder) sold the company to Dan in 1999. He was not involved in any of this. He (and I) found out about the lawsuit in the LA Times. In addition to embezzling this m [...]